Going to DisneyWorld - stay in the park or outside

[Tsuchiya]

Enjoy your time out there. I've been 3 times in the past 6 years and loved each visit.

Also Disney> Universal. Harry Potter is cool and all (and I'll never tire of seeing that T-Rex at Islands of Adventure), but Universal parks are expensive and individually neither is on the same level of any main Disney park.

 

[Southern Dad]

Enjoy your time out there. I've been 3 times in the past 6 years and loved each visit.

Also Disney> Universal. Harry Potter is cool and all (and I'll never tire of seeing that T-Rex at Islands of Adventure), but Universal parks are expensive and individually neither is on the same level of any main Disney park.

I've found that from financial aspect it makes sense to either do a Walt Disney World vacation or a Universal Studios/Islands of Adventure/Sea World/Wet & Wild vacation but not to try and do both at the same time. One day tickets are the most expensive.

For example, if you are going to Walt Disney World (which has four parks) the tickets are very expensive for the first three days, then very cheap after that. For example:

• One Day Ticket - $99
• Two Day Ticket - $188 ($94 per day)
• Three Day Ticket - $274 ($91.34 per day)
• Four Day Ticket - $294 ($73.50 per day)
• Five Day Ticket - $304 ($60.80 per day)
• Six Day Ticket - $314 ($52.34 per day)
• Seven Day Ticket - $324 ($46.29 per day)
• Eight Day Ticket - $334 ($41.75 per day)
• Nine Day Ticket - $344 ($38.23 per day)
• Ten Day Ticket - $354 ($35.40 per day)

Universal Studios is in the same neighborhood for a one day ticket but then has a steeper curve.

One Day - $96
Two Day - $137 ($68 per day)
Three Day - $146 ($49 per day)
Four Day - $156 ($39 per day)

Someone traveling to Walt Disney World for a week would spend $324 for a full week at WDW's four parks. But if they decided to hit WDW, UA and Sea World the cost would go up dramatically...

Five day WDW $304 + One Day UA $96 + One Day Sea World (weekday) $65 = $465 each person (add $40 if UA includes IOA). Multiply that difference by a family of four and it starts to add up.

On the other hand you could do one vacation to WDW's parks where you spend $324 per adult (a little less per kid) and another vacation where you use the Orlando Flex Ticket which is $319 and gives you 14 days of unlimited visits to Universal Studios/Islands of Adventure/Sea World/Wet & Wild/Aquatica.

 

[maflynn]

I'm resurrecting my old WDW thread

I just booked my April 2016 vacation, the family and I are staying at the Contemporary. I wanted to post a couple of thoughts to keep this thread relevant and also the discussion which is always helpful.

The last time we went, was in November and that was great (albeit cold) but what I found out after returning from vacation is how hard it was for my daughters to catch back up in school. I totally underestimated how far they'd fall behind in school. I took my work mentality of just plowing through the extra work vs. Learning something brand new which is of course what's happening with my kids. Now its school vacations only which of course means larger crowds and higher prices.

First off, like Macs/Apple products there is a whole subculture for Disney vacations. I've been frequenting one of the specific Disney sites for advice.

The meal plan. We had selected the meal plan for our last Disney vacation, we made it work, in part because we chose a week that was within the free meal plan incentive. This year being in April, no such incentive will be open to us. Now that my kids are 10 years old, they for some stupid reason are considered adults when choosing the meal plan and the cost rises dramatically. So much so that after running the numbers, it makes more sense to avoid the meal plan. I checked computations with the Quick Service only meal plans and the regular Dining meal plan. I'm saving on average about 500 bucks with what I think we'll be doing for meals (though I can't make reservations until this fall).

Booking early this seems to make sense more and more as some of the rooms disappear rather quickly. I booked the package the moment I was able to and even then, I was unsuccessful in selecting the options I wanted.

Disney has been seemingly started to curtail the incentives for staying on property the past couple of years and increasing the price as well. This is making it harder to justify staying on property. As of right now, we're booked to stay there but as I talk this over with the wife, its hard for us to consider a Disney Resort for anything after this visit. I'm not saying we'll go off property after this vacation but we will look at the options hard with a more critical eye.

 

[maflynn]

I just booked my April 2016 vacation, the family and I are staying at the Contemporary. I wanted to post a couple of thoughts to keep this thread relevant and also the discussion which is always helpful.

I wanted to update this thread, as mentioned above, I booked my WDW vacation for April 2016. I fully expect the parks to be very full even if our kid's school vacation is at the end of April compared to others.

Disney, and many other sites highly recommend booking your dining reservations 180 days in advance of your stay and I did that. I will say that I'm suffering a bit from sticker shock. I passed on some possible reservations primarily because of the costs. For instance the Illuminations Dessert Party in Epcot. You get to enjoy desserts while watching the fireworks. The downside is that you're paying 50 dollars a person, throw in the fact that my children are considered adults by Disney because they'll be 10 means I'll be shelling out 200 dollars for desert. Another issue is that event has no seating which is baffling given that you're at the park all day and would really like a place to sit (other then the ground).

Overall though picking the restaurants and itinerary was a fun family exercise as my kids helped pick what they wanted. Basically we all picked something we really wanted to enjoy.

Still a week long vacation is going to cost 2,000 in food alone.

 

[AustinIllini]

I wanted to update this thread, as mentioned above, I booked my WDW vacation for April 2016. I fully expect the parks to be very full even if our kid's school vacation is at the end of April compared to others.

Disney, and many other sites highly recommend booking your dining reservations 180 days in advance of your stay and I did that. I will say that I'm suffering a bit from sticker shock. I passed on some possible reservations primarily because of the costs. For instance the Illuminations Dessert Party in Epcot. You get to enjoy desserts while watching the fireworks. The downside is that you're paying 50 dollars a person, throw in the fact that my children are considered adults by Disney because they'll be 10 means I'll be shelling out 200 dollars for desert. Another issue is that event has no seating which is baffling given that you're at the park all day and would really like a place to sit (other then the ground).

Overall though picking the restaurants and itinerary was a fun family exercise as my kids helped pick what they wanted. Basically we all picked something we really wanted to enjoy.

Still a week long vacation is going to cost 2,000 in food alone.

I've said this in this thread before and I'll say it again. The dining system has ruined Disney's sense of adventure. I hate, hate, hate going to the park and working my day around a dinner reservation.

End of April? When is Easter? Spring breaks are usually earlier, so you might be pleasantly surprised.

 

[maflynn]

I've said this in this thread before and I'll say it again. The dining system has ruined Disney's sense of adventure. I hate, hate, hate going to the park and working my day around a dinner reservation.

I know what you mean and there's no way for you to just show up at a sit down restaurant and get seated (maybe after an hour wait) if you don't have reservations. We have park hopper tickets this time and that opens things up to a point. We still need to consider travel time and what we do in relation to our reservations. I only did sit down restaurants for dinner only. I selected a time that worked well, i.e., 6:00 to 7:00. I figured that will give everyone some down time after a long day in the parks and re-energize them for anything else we may do after dinner.

End of April? When is Easter? Spring breaks are usually earlier, so you might be pleasantly surprised.

Easter is thankfully early in 2016 (March 27th) so I dodged that bullet. I expect lots of crowds, if I could convince my wife to move the vacation to next fall I would, but even then we'd not beat the crowds.

From looking at other forums such as wdwmagic, this past September was very crowded, and Disney has the food and wine festival in October, along wth the fact many school systems in the south have a school vacation in October there is no longer any "good" time to visit Disney.[/QUOTE]

 

[sim667]

I wanted to update this thread, as mentioned above, I booked my WDW vacation for April 2016. I fully expect the parks to be very full even if our kid's school vacation is at the end of April compared to others.

Disney, and many other sites highly recommend booking your dining reservations 180 days in advance of your stay and I did that. I will say that I'm suffering a bit from sticker shock. I passed on some possible reservations primarily because of the costs. For instance the Illuminations Dessert Party in Epcot. You get to enjoy desserts while watching the fireworks. The downside is that you're paying 50 dollars a person, throw in the fact that my children are considered adults by Disney because they'll be 10 means I'll be shelling out 200 dollars for desert. Another issue is that event has no seating which is baffling given that you're at the park all day and would really like a place to sit (other then the ground).

Overall though picking the restaurants and itinerary was a fun family exercise as my kids helped pick what they wanted. Basically we all picked something we really wanted to enjoy.

Still a week long vacation is going to cost 2,000 in food alone.

Do you go to disneyland every year?

 

[maflynn]

Do you go to disneyland every year?

Never been to Disneyland - only DisneyWorld.

No, our usual M.O. is to go every few years, though there are exceptions. We went in 2014 and are planning on going in 2016.

 

[nburwell]

I've done both. Stayed in the park (with family years ago) and stayed outside the park (with friends). We rented a car when we stayed outside the park, and getting around wasn't any trouble at all. However, I would probably prefer to stay in Disney if I had a choice (especially if you have a family). I just feel like it's more convenient, even if you have access to a rental car.

Just my $.02.

 

[AustinIllini]

I've done both. Stayed in the park (with family years ago) and stayed outside the park (with friends). We rented a car when we stayed outside the park, and getting around wasn't any trouble at all. However, I would probably prefer to stay in Disney if I had a choice (especially if you have a family). I just feel like it's more convenient, even if you have access to a rental car.

Just my $.02.

Agreed with the staying on site thing, especially since it's not necessarily that expensive to stay onsite. Art of Animation and the All-Star resorts come to mind as affordable options.

 

[bunnspecial]

The last time I was at WDW was in 2009, and we split our two week stay between a park resort(Animal Kingdom) and a nearby independent(Wyndham Bonnet Creek).

The Disney rooms were-IMO-a bit sparse and small especially for the cost, but at the end of the day I'd prefer staying in a lower-priced Disney resort to even a very nice off-site location(which Bonnet Creek is).

The difference-to me-is in the shuttle system. Most hotels/resorts offer shuttle services, but they have NOTHING on the Disney system(both bus and monorail) in terms of efficiency and convenience. In our particular situation, we actually had to call ahead both for transportation to and from the parks and it could be a 30-45 minute wait. Even then, the drop off/pick up was a significant distance from the parks(about as far away as driving and parking). By contrast, the right Disney shuttle would take you wherever you wanted to go within the park system provided you got on the right one, and do so at 5-10 minute intervals. The pick-up and drop-off was pretty much at the gate of all the parks.

Add park hopping and/or re-entry to your tickets and this is especially nice as you can go home in the afternoon and return for dinner and the fireworks, or whatever else you may want to do.

So, again, I'd pick on-site over anything else based on this alone. We still ventured out(off site) for dinner most nights in our personal vehicle, although doing that is nothing compared to actually trying to get into the parks via car.

 

[maflynn]

I just feel like it's more convenient, even if you have access to a rental car.

One of the benefits we like with staying on property is the ability to leave and comeback. Take a break, go back to the resort do some swimming and then go back to the park. While you can do that when staying off property, the turn around time is generally so long that its not worth it.

 

[bruinsrme]

My wife's side of the family and I went to Disney a few years back.
We stayed outside the park.
Each day we literately lost 2 hours a day getting into the park.
-get the kids ready
-pack the car
-drive to the park
-park
-take the shuttle
-and finally walk through the entrance.

The kids started to get tired around 1pm. Meltdowns of our kids and other kids were inevitable. They just got tired.
This lead to some half days and without returning to the park.

In the park you can always hop onto the monorail and head back to the room for lunch, splash around the pool and nap. Then return to the park later in the day without having to pack up, drive, park and wait for the shuttle.

Tickets are not cheap. I feel the extra you pay to stay in the park is made up by being able to do more in the parks.

 

[sim667]

Never been to Disneyland - only DisneyWorld.

No, our usual M.O. is to go every few years, though there are exceptions. We went in 2014 and are planning on going in 2016.

Same thing.

I couldn't think of anything worse than going once in all honesty, let alone biannually.

I rather enjoyed dismaland though

 

[maflynn]

Tickets are not cheap. I feel the extra you pay to stay in the park is made up by being able to do more in the parks.

They're not but the price delta drops very quickly after 3 days so if you're going be there for a week, the cost of the tickets does go down rather quickly. I think from day 4 on, its like 10 dollars a day per ticket.

 

[ejb190]

Having worked at Epcot years and years ago and knowing my family, I knew that by picking the sit-down restaurants carefully, we could make the meals some of the best highlights of the trip, not just something we had to do. And it worked very well. We figured out roughly what day we were going to what park. Then I "assigned" each person a park or area to pick a restaurant for that day. Sometimes it was dinner, sometimes lunch, but we always planned for at least one sit-down meal together per day. We did end up canceling one reservation, but back then there wasn't a charge. To this day, I think the meals are what everyone remembers about that trip.

When planning meals, don't forget all of the Disney hotels have restaurants. One of my favorite evenings at WDW involved leaving Animal Kingdom and catching a bus to Wilderness Lodge to eat at the Whispering Canyon. Then we took the boat over to the TTC (watching the fireworks over Magic Kingdom as we went), hopped the monorail and rode it all the way back around to the Magic Kingdom. From there we took a bus back to the All-Star where we were staying.

I've said it before, there are a lot of books and websites dedicated to WDW and all the different restaurants. So there is no need to guess.

 

[Southern Dad]

We literally just got back from WDW yesterday. We stayed at AKL in a one bedroom, and were on the QS dining plan which works out for us. @maflynn why are you getting hopper passes? The hopper option adds $64 per ticket. When I'm traveling with children, I'd rather not switch parks, we just plan our days using crowd calendar predictions and have fun.

Now that WDW has Fastpass+ you can book three Fastpasses at 60 days out from your date of check in. Mark your calendar for this.

The contemporary resort is a great resort to stay in location wise. However, in my experience if I'm staying at a Deluxe Resort, you can save a bundle by utilizing DVC properties. I'm DVC but you don't have to be to use it. An example is that a week in April at Contemporary's Bay Lake Tower is $1638 - $2156 for a studio (depending on view) for the whole week. Studios have a kitchenette and sleep four. Bay Lake Tower connects to the Contemporary by a bridge.

When I need to rent points, I use David's Vacation Club, they have a cost calculator on their website. There are other forums where you can find people renting points cheaper, I just like the no hassle method.

You are going to need to make sure to load a few apps on your iPhones and iPads. WDW now has free WiFi in all parks and resorts. My favorite is Disney World Magic Guide. It has park hours, wait times, park maps, and most importantly restaurant menus including prices. You need the one from Undercover Tourist. It gives some advice as well as park times, and waits. Of course, you have to have My Disney Experience, which is from WDW themselves. This is where you will see your Fasspass+ reservations, check out your Photopass pictures and such. If you are buying the Photopass do it in advance, it saves you $30.

While waiting in lines, you'll need to make sure to have apps on the iOS devices to keep the kids occupied. We got lots of strangers to even get involved when we were playing Charades! and using Disney trivia and other Disney categories. Because of Fastpass+ we really didn't wait in many lines nothing really long but we caught a couple rides for second time which caused a wait.

 

[maflynn]

When planning meals, don't forget all of the Disney hotels have restaurants.

Definitely, we have a number of reservations at the Contemporary, Poly, and Fort Wilderness (Hoop-Dee-Doo Musical Revue). My mentality is the dinner reservations are a nice way to cap off a busy day.

were on the QS dining plan

Running the numbers I found that dining plan rarely makes sense for us. There's a number of websites out there that help compute your dining expenses and doing that, I found that if I went on the QS dining plan, we'd be spending 400+ more then just paying out of pocket.

The only time imo, the dining plan makes sense is when Disney offers that for free which they do around the November time frame.

The hopper option adds $64 per ticket.

We wanted that ability.

Now that WDW has Fastpass+ you can book three Fastpasses at 60 days out from your date of check in. Mark your calendar for this.

You are going to need to make sure to load a few apps on your iPhones and iPads.

Thanks but I've been to WDW a few times and the scheduling of the various milestones is understood, i.e., not my first rodeo

 

[maflynn]

I've been trying to book airfare for my family during april vacation. I'm never going to do this again (fly during april vacation).

I've seen prices anywhere from 3,000 dollars to 7,000 for a family of four going from Boston to Orlando. Its crazy how much the airlines jacked up the rates. I can find some odd combinations and get the price down to 2,400, but that includes connections, and in some cases flying for 10 hours (long lay overs).

If I fly out of New York (that location doesn't have spring break for their schools), I can get a round trip (using a combination of skymiles and dollars) for 1,000 bucks.

Looks like we may end up driving to new york and flying out of there, its about a 3 to 4 hour drive.

 

[Southern Dad]

I've been trying to book airfare for my family during april vacation. I'm never going to do this again (fly during april vacation).

I've seen prices anywhere from 3,000 dollars to 7,000 for a family of four going from Boston to Orlando. Its crazy how much the airlines jacked up the rates. I can find some odd combinations and get the price down to 2,400, but that includes connections, and in some cases flying for 10 hours (long lay overs).

If I fly out of New York (that location doesn't have spring break for their schools), I can get a round trip (using a combination of skymiles and dollars) for 1,000 bucks.

Looks like we may end up driving to new york and flying out of there, its about a 3 to 4 hour drive.

I was going to suggest using PVD but I looked in the computer and saw the same thing you did. The price jumps about more than $500 per ticket during that week. However, if you look at PHL to MCO (RT) it doesn't. I rant PHL to MCO using 4/16 - 4/22 just as rough dates and found four seats on Delta for under $1100. Might be worth a look.

 

[maflynn]

Thanks to the helpful members here, I was able to book tickets out of Albany. I was first considering JFK, but the idea of traveling in and out of NYC, really gave me the shudders. From what I hear Albany is a better experience, getting there will be less time, and probably less hectic/stressful.

Overall, I'm really at peace with that decision

Thanks however